1. Field of the Disclosure
Embodiments of the disclosure relate in general to the field of computers and similar technologies, and in particular to software utilized in this field. Still more particularly, it provides a system, method, and computer-usable medium for purchase, billing, and payment transactions.
2. Description of the Related Art
Today's consumers have become accustomed to using a wide variety of cards in their daily activities. In addition to identification cards, consumers also conduct financial and purchase transactions with credit cards, debit cards, stored value cards, and cards issued by individual vendors. While many of these vendors will accept other financial cards for payment, they often prefer to issue their own card in an attempt to reinforce their brand identity and to establish closer relationships with their customers. However, such vendor-issued cards are typically not accepted by other vendors. The growing volume of financial and purchase cards available to consumers often results in having to decide how many, and which, cards will be carried. As a result, the choice is often to pick a small number of cards that are most widely accepted by the largest number of vendors. By definition, such cards are generally not vendor-issued. However, different cards may be carried at different times for different purposes.
As a result, it is not unusual for individuals to still receive a large number of bills, each of which need to be paid on a periodic basis. Traditional methods of paying bills, which include receiving billing statements interleaved with promotions, writing paper checks, recording payments, and mailing envelopes have become cumbersome for many. In response to this issue, financial institutions, service providers, and individual vendors have begun to offer on-line bill presentment services, which have become increasingly popular. However, each of these implementations has its own advantages and limitations. Financial institutions provide simplified access to funding accounts for payment of individual vendors, but detailed purchase transaction information for individual vendors is usually not available. Service providers may be able to provide transaction level billing detail, but not be able to preserve a vendor's brand identity or convey their promotional offers. Vendors are able to not only maintain their brand identity and offer promotions with their own service, but they can often offer details about each purchase transaction on a billing statement. However, most consumers are reluctant to go to multiple vendor sites simply to review and pay their bills.
In view of the foregoing, there is a need for consumers to have a single purchase card that would be accepted by multiple vendors in place of their own vendor-issued cards, yet still receive individual billing statements from each vendor. Likewise, there is a need to have such billing statements aggregated for on-line presentment to consumers, who would then be able to review and examine the details of individual transactions within each billing statement while online. There is a corresponding need for vendors to preserve their respective brand identities and have access to an additional channel for their promotions. Additionally, there is a need for the ability to make payments on-line and for vendors to receive them electronically.